E7400 Overclocking Help

Hi guys,

I have been reading a lot of overclocking guides and results of the overclocking. I know that every chip is not made exactly the same. After countless tries, I finally managed to OC my e7400 to 3.8 Ghz. However, I realized that I have a really high temperature when loading prime95. My idle temp is 42 - 44 degree. But, my high load temp could go up to 75 degree. I know the MAX temperature for this chip is 74.1 degree which now becomes my concern because my chip could go higher than that.
I realize that my temperature is that high because of my CPU Vcore. It is set at 1.54375V which is a lot higher than what I expected. I have tried to up the NB voltage and lowered the cpu vcore but had no luck making it stable. Could anyone with pro-ness in overclocking help me out with this issue other then bringing back my OC to 3.6ghz? I saw some people managed to get to 4 ghz with only 1.35V or something like that which is a lot lower than my cpu Vcore right now yet higher frequency. Could I be doing something very wrong? Your help is greatly appreciated. Below are my screenshots of my bios and temperature measurement.

HOLY SH!T!!! what are you doing with that vcore the max for a 45nm core 2 duo is 1.3625. Ive got mine at 4GHz with 1.36v, a 400mhz bus speed, and a 10x multiplier. Ive got my Northbridge and Southbridge at 1.38v. so lower you southbridge, which has nothing to do with overclocking, and raise your northbridge. make sure your memory can support speeds up to 800mhz. Also raise your FSB ( front side bus voltage ) but not much higher than 1.36 either. My FSB is at 1.33v. Set your RAM to a 1:1 ratio with your bus speed which looks like its under your "FSB to Northbridge strap" Assuming you havent already damaged your chip, you might get a decent overclock. Also make sure youve got a decent cooler. Ive got an Arctic Cooling Freezer 7 Pro ($30 on newegg) and with the stock paste it idles at 31*C and maxes out under non synthetic load at 56*C. Prime it hits 71*C

Set the fsb at 400 and your fsb strap at 333Mhz. Also put your ratio setting at 9.0, make sure your memory is 1:1 ratio and set your NB Voltage at 1.3-1.4V. Try keeping our memory voltage and timings at stock. After its all said and done you should have a CPU frequency of 3.6Ghz.

Edit: Sorry I did not read the part where you don't want to bring it back to 3.6Ghz although I feel this is plenty for you CPU.

Thanks for the reply and suggestion. One more thing i would like to know. Which one is going to damage a cpu? the high voltage or the high temperature? I mean I know high temp will definitely destroy a chip. How about if I have a very high voltage but low temp, will it still destroy a chip? If it will, then I don’t see a point to use a water cooling at all since the high voltage will destroy the chip anyway even though the cpu is cold. This is not particularly apply to my case. I just would like to have the knowledge of it. Thanks in advance for all the replies and helps.

I could overclock this chip to 3.5GHz with 1.293V and ran 5 and 1/2 hours of Prime95 (small fft) without any errors. In addition, I also ran 3 hours of Prime95 (blend) without any errors or warnings.

Basically, FSB is set to 333MHz and multiplier at x10.5

Temp at idle is 42 C
Temp at load is 58 C

I know all chips aren't made equal but you could use it as a sort of benchmark. At 1.5V is definitely too high and way over specification which could kill your chip pretty soon. Try to get it under 1.4V if possible.